


Of Blind Spots and Broken People

by inkfeathers



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Long-awaited Love Confessions, M/M, Retirement, mentions of minor character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-22
Updated: 2016-08-22
Packaged: 2018-08-10 11:40:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7843513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkfeathers/pseuds/inkfeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John visits him again—after more than a decade of silence—on a cool day of November.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Blind Spots and Broken People

**Author's Note:**

> I'm blaming Mr.Holmes for this.

 

John visits him again—after more than a decade of silence—on a cool day of November.

They stare at each other at the doorway for what feels like hours. Neither entirely sure of what John is doing there. Neither entirely sure if Sherlock would like the answer.

John clears his throat, because one of them has to do something. And Sherlock blinks several times out of his contemplation, before gesturing for John to enter.

There are no words uttered in that exchange, there is no need for them. They had developed their own private language decades ago, and neither of them had forgotten.

Despite…

John looks around the house, in a way that is so Johnesque it makes Sherlock want to scream. The things he has missed, the various ways in which John has changed and aged were hitting him in the face like a freight train. Deduction after deduction rushing in his brain like they used to do, when he lived in the city. (Abroad for a long time. Volunteered for MSF. Came by train. Just drank coffee. Lives alone.) But instead of feeling like he could move the moon with a turn of a hand, like he was brilliant and amazing and the whole city was left at the mercy of his genius, it makes the hollowness he carried around inside him more blatantly apparent. It makes his bones ache and echo throughout his body in an impossible longing that had not been abated despite all the years apart. It leaves him cold. It leaves him empty.

“Nice place you got here,” John says at last. “Never thought you’d be one for settling down in the Downs.”

Sherlock hates John’s attempts at casualness. Sherlock’s heart is beating against his chest in a way it hadn’t done since 2019 and John has decided to play it as if they were casual acquaintances who saw each other every other month to play cards and mock each other’s retired life.

But Sherlock decides to play along. Because, really, he hasn’t the energy for these things anymore.

“Hmm. You are not the first one to point that out.” John’s lips twitch, and he looks elsewhere.

“No, suppose not.”

The silence after that is heavy with the things unspoken, with the weight they had carried ever since that awful night of September. But if there is anything at all they are good at, that is ignoring things. So Sherlock does just that and indicates John to sit down, as he goes to put the kettle on.

In the kitchen, Sherlock can’t help but look at his reflection on the countertop. He is met with the look of what he deems to be an old man-despite numerous people telling otherwise- weighted by the years of loneliness, and regret. His hair is turning grey now, and there are bags under his eyes. There are no visible scars on his face. Not like John’s. Just frown lines and crow’s feet and the burn marks on his hands.

He shakes these thoughts away, deeming them useless. There were no magic tricks that could erase the past fourteen years, just as there were no ways to pull one’s words back to one’s mouth, once they were out there. He grabs a tray and serves the tea and goes to face John once again.

They both sit at the sofa. Because it is more comfortable and because then they won’t have to look at each other. Not looking at each other is what they have been doing for years, after all. Even before that night.

“It really is a lovely place,” John continues, clearly not finished with his dreadful ramble. “Taken right out of a magazine, it seems.”

Sherlock hums and taps his fingers against the teacup. He doesn’t mention that he chose it because he thought John would have liked how the sun rays battered upon the garden, or the way the clouds looked on the blue canvas of the sky, or that he would like the smell of wood and fresh grass. And that maybe, he would have been happy here, in another life, by Sherlock’s side.

“So how have you been?” John asks, finally daring to look at Sherlock.

“I’ve…been good. This place is… good for the lungs.”

_God, you are a fucking moron._

“Right,” John says, and it is as awkward as such an answer warrants. “I heard you… made honey,” at this, the first hint of a smile threatens to appear in John’s lips. Pleased, if not a little thrown off by the change of air, Sherlock feels the corner of his own lips twitch.

“I have dedicated my late life to contemplate and study the social systems and behavior of honey bees. I make observations on the structure of their colonies and the changes they experiment with each variation on their environment. Alongside, I manage to make honey, yes.”

John snorts and then lets out a chuckle.

Sherlock’s chest expands and contracts painfully at the sound. His mind palace shakes with it. In the room that he dedicated to storing all the best memories of his life with John, the curtains finally make way for a glimpse of light.

“I just… I can’t see… why would you become an apiologist?” John asks and though there is genuine curiosity in the question, there is also a little bit of teasing, and a little bit of awe, and also, Sherlock realizes with no small amount of wonder, fondness.

Sherlock shrugs and looks away at the fireplace.

“I didn’t know anything about bees, much less about beekeeping. I wanted something I had to learn from scratch. Make a fresh start.”

John’s playful smile falls, and the atmosphere tenses up again, and suddenly, Sherlock has had enough.

“Why are you here?” he asks, at last.

Sherlock counts eight heartbeats before John answers.

“I’m… I’m here because I wanted to apologize,” John says, voice strained.

Whatever Sherlock expected to hear, that was definitely not it. And Sherlock is too shell-shocked at first to respond. The words did not make sense, they simply just didn’t.

“What on earth would you need to apologize for?” he asks frankly, utterly baffled.

The look John gives him mirrors his own confusion.

“For being a complete dick? For dismissing your feelings? For venting out the worst of my anger to the only person who—” John’s voice breaks and he has to take a deep breath.

Sherlock’s heart speeds up and he is left staring at his old friend with something akin to horror. John Watson cannot think— he simply cannot think that he has any blame in this. That all these years, this rift between them, were all on his shoulders. The thought is so illogical it makes Sherlock question John’s own sanity, before he realizes the redundancy of that thought.

 _John Watson_ , Sherlock thinks, _hasn’t changed a bit in 14 years. He is still the same self-sacrificing mad idiot you fell in love with. Unsurprising, really._

“John. Everything that happened to you, everything you lost, was in no small part my fault. You were right, that day, what you said. You were right and we both knew it. We both knew it and it ended us.” Sherlock states in a dispassionate tone, because these are just facts. Ones that John seems to have forgotten.

“No, no, no, Sherlock,” John insists, placing his tea cup on the coffee table, and when he says his name it sounds like a pleading. “I handled it badly. I handled it all badly—”

“You were entitled to your anger.”

“But not with you!” John keeps insisting. “You were the last person—the very last person I should have— you did everything you could.”

“It wasn’t enough!” Sherlock snaps, voice ragged. “It was utterly _useless_. I made an unforgivable mistake. And it cost you—everything.”

John closes his eyes as if pained, and turns his head.

When he speaks again, his voice is much more calm.

“You want me to blame you for not being able to deduce a psychopath’s every intention?”

“I want you to blame me for what _I am to blame._ ”

“I can’t, because that’s utter nonsense.”

Sherlock flings his tea cup against the floor.

They both stare at it.

Taking small calming breaths, Sherlock speaks up.

“You are telling me that you haven’t spoken to me in a decade and a half because you—what? Were looking for the right moment to apologize for being reasonable about your association with me for once in your life?”

Just as John is about to retort, the response seems to die on his lips, and the exasperation melts away from his face.

“This is getting us nowhere,” John says softly, pinching the bridge of his nose with two fingers. He closes his eyes and collects his thoughts. Sherlock knows this because he knows John’s expression when he is about to say something, but is looking for the best way to say it. And Sherlock knows that, this time, John is finally going to speak about the actual reason he came here at all. Sherlock leaves him to it. John is nothing if not efficient. And if he has already decided to say whatever he is about to say, it is very unlikely that he will back down. In the end, he makes a request.

“Tell me something, Sherlock,” John starts, and Sherlock’s every cell are preparing for the next words.

 

“Were you in love with me?”

 

Everything stops. The chirp of Starlings, the tweets of the Nightingales. Even the dust motes seem to pause in their endless dance around the air to wait for his answer.

It shouldn’t be so difficult, admitting it. After all these years. In fact, it isn’t. Why should it be? He is sure the whole bloody world already knows anyway. And he is not ashamed of it. Of all the things he is ashamed of, he isn’t ashamed of this. Loving John was second nature to him, yes. But it wasn’t the kind of second nature as his abrasiveness was. Or his OCD. Or his love for the macabre. It was humbling, and sometimes wonderful, and oftentimes terrible. But it was inevitable and, more importantly,

it still _was_.

“Yes,” he breathes.

Elementary.

John doesn’t avert his eyes. Instead they hold each other’s gazes for what feels like an eternity. Both trapped in a moment that is both momentous and unsurprising. Both going over scenarios in their heads on how this conversation might end. In the end, it is Sherlock who breaks the spell with a petty question.

“How long did it take you to figure it out?” he asks with only a small note of interest.

John lets out an unamused snort and gives him an apologetic smile. “Couple of years,” he admits. Then he frowns, and his expression turns serious. “Why didn’t you—”

“Say anything? When exactly would I have done that, John?” Sherlock demands, angry. “The night before your wedding? Or perhaps during it? How about after your Sex Holiday, hmm? Would that had been good? No, better yet. How about the day I let Moriarty kill your daughter?” he adds cruelly.

John doesn’t react to the bait, though. He keeps calm, looking at him with an unimpressed expression.

“What about before?”

Sherlock gapes for a moment before exhaling tiredly. “I didn’t… Well, I did. But I preferred not to—”

“Think about it.” John finishes for him.

Sherlock turns to look at him, taken aback.

John exhales and looks at the fire place.

“We have both been… unbelievably thick-headed about this. Particularly me. You and I are… the bloody epitome of mutual misunderstandings.” John reflects.

“Wonderful observation, John. As always. Really, you should be a philosopher.” Sherlock snarls, and stands up. Not really sure what to do now that he is on his feet, but desperate to find a way out of this conversation.

In the end he pretends to go back to the kitchen, but a hand pulls him back midway.

“Let go.”

“No.”

“John,” he warns.

“No, listen to me. Turn back and listen to me.”

Sherlock does, if only to shut John up, fearing the pity he is sure he will find in John’s eyes. The sight he is met with, however, is a far cry from that. John’s expression is serious. Deadly serious. And he licks his lips and shifts a little, in the way he does when he knows he is about to say something important.

“I don’t know when I fell in love with you. Sometimes I think it was after I realized you had cured my imaginary limp, or after you made me laugh for the first time in a life-time. Sometimes I like to think it was that very first day at Barts, when you came into my world and shook it all up with wild black hair and mad deductions. It doesn’t matter, I think. It all ends up with me being head-over-heels for you, and being unable to admit it. Even to myself. And when I did…it was too late.

“I never thought you could feel the same way about me, Sherlock. Looking back at it I can’t believe how blind I was, but there you have it. If I had known… If I had gotten my head out of my arse for one second and _looked_ at you, I might have saved us a lot of pain. But what’s done it’s done, and can’t be turned back. And what I’m asking you now, why I came here today is to see if you could give me—us, another chance.”

Sherlock is left standing there. Eyes wide, breath hitched. John’s words circling around his head like a confused bird flying around in a cage. He tries to make sense of them and comes up with nothing. He ends up asking whatever God that might listen to please stop this senseless day.

“A chance for _what_?!” he explodes. “For spending your days in the middle of nowhere with a barely-functioning sociopath—?”

“Oh would you please stop calling yourself a sociopath—” John interrupts, rolling his eyes.

Sherlock ignores him.

“—A chance to burden yourself with what’s left of a once consulting detective? A chance for us to tear each other apart?”

“A chance to spend the rest of my life with the love of my life.” John says, voice ragged.

It’s too much. Sherlock can’t handle it anymore. He bends himself in half and shoves his face in his hands.

“You are insane,” he rasps.

“Sherlock please, all I’m asking…”

“No. no, no, no.”

John grabs his arms and gently tries to pry them apart with no effect.

“Sherlock,” his voice is soft and so so tender it makes the knot in his throat tighten. “Just let me prove myself. You have always brought the best in me. The best and the worst, I grant. But—we are complete together. I’m not asking for grand gestures and I’m not looking for the perfect relationship. I just want _you_ , I just want—”

“ _Stop it_.” Sherlock begs.

“ _Sherlock_ ,” John pleads.

“Go away, please. I can’t—I’m sorry, John. I can’t. I _can’t_. Please.” This was crueller than anything else Sherlock could have imagined. A beating, he could have handled. A final, scathing word would have been much better. But not this. Not _this_. Sherlock is on the verge of tears, and John better leave before Sherlock is subjected to yet another humiliation.

It doesn’t take long after that. John lets go of his arms and strides to the door, and Sherlock hears a muffled sob before the sound of the door closing.

Sherlock breaks down on the floor. Trying to inhale through ragged breaths. Trying to control uncontrollable tears. He raises himself enough to swipe everything away from the coffee table. He crawls to an open coffin nearby full of bottles and throws them as far and as hard as he can manage. The delightful sound of glass breaking doing nothing to appease him. He stands up and grabs a handful of books to throw them in despair. He makes a mess of everything. Because he always makes a mess of everything. Even the beautiful things. Particularly the beautiful things. He ends up on his bedroom, punching the wall with all his might, rejoicing in the way his knuckles come out bloodied.

 _You utterly stupid creature_ , an ugly voice says in his head. _You just wasted the only chance you had of getting what you wanted. What you have wanted for ages. How could you be so idiotic?_

He is not what John needs. He can barely keep himself sane most days, how could he hope to keep them together? How could he hope to be enough for him? John has found himself adrift once again and is now searching for the man he remembers brought him back from the realm of the living dead. But that man is gone. He is _dead_. He died on 2019, on a cold night of September.

 _You lost your only chance_ , the voice continues, _and you are never getting it back_.

His sobs come dry now. His eyes are swollen and there is snot trailing down his nose. He is exhausted. He punches one last time and collapses on the floor like a ragged doll.

 _Coward_.

He falls asleep that way, which is, to say the least, _not_ a way in which a man his age should sleep on.

In the morning his back is killing him and his eyes sting. He doesn’t get up until his morning breath starts to bother him. He can feel the threat of a harrowing black mood in the hollowness of his chest. And while the part of him that was making every muscle scream for him to run out of the house in search for John has abated, days will still pass before he stops feeling like shit.

 _It is better this way_ , he insists, brushing his teeth. _There is only room for one broken person in this_ —

There is a knock on the door.

Sherlock thinks he imagined it, at first. He fights down the glimmer of hope lighting up in his chest. He is paused in his movements, ears tingling. He is about to give up hope when the knock sounds again, this time firmer, and he spits in the sink and makes his way tentatively to the door.

 _It can’t be. It can’t be. It can’t be_ —

It is.

John stands waiting for him at the other side.

They stare at each other.

Outside, the Starlings and the Nightingales have started their morning song.

**Author's Note:**

> So that was my first Sherlock fanfic. Angsty as hell, just as I like it. I hope I didn't embarrass myself too much. And English is not my first language so if you notice any errors please let me know.  
> Hope you enjoyed it : ) feedback is really appreciated!


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